GH: Van Halen Review

Last week’s post on this game pretty much says it all, but if you’ve gotta get more fuel for your Activision/Guitar Hero/Van Halen hate, then you’ll find my review of the game up at Gameshark today. The final score: A big honk’n D (which is more than it deserved).

Impressions: Guitar Hero: Van Halen

For the last week I’ve been playing Guitar Hero: Van Halen. I feel sad just having to write that. The only applicable analog to that sentence would be for me to write, “For the past week I’ve been continually banging my head on my desk.” They are, more or less, synonymous activities.

And I liked Van Halen.

First of all, this is the single worst-looking Guitar Hero game I’ve ever played. That includes the PS2-exclusive Guitar Hero 1. The use of color has not been a strong suit of the franchise since Neversoft took over its development (this game, btw, is actually developed by a company called Underground Development, using Neversoft’s game engine), and like every GH game since numero tres, this game looks muted and bland. The character models, though, are just flat out ugly. Not to mention creepy. This is a budget game with a regular game’s price.

Second, the audio is in stereo only. Someone is going to have to explain to me how a game, especially a music game, published in 2009 manages to not support Dolby Digital surround sound. This is probably my biggest single beef with the game because it’s apparent in every single song you play that that the audio is not as clear or encompassing as in any other comparable game.

Third, not one track from the Sammy Hagar era? Really? Hey, I know many people hate Sammy Hagar. I’m not one of them, but whatever. I acknowledge David Lee Roth is a superior talent, but then, so was Terrell Owens in his prime and, like Owens, Roth is an ass. Also, let’s take a quick look at the scoreboard since Hagar and Van Halen parted ways:

Albums from Hagar (includes the one from Chickenfoot): 7

Albums from Van Halen: 1 (almost 12 years ago)

Now tell me who’s about making music and who’s just looking to cash in with the least amount of effort possible.

Anyway, no matter how much you might feel Van Halen is only Van Halen with monkey Roth in the lead, the band still put out four frigg’n albums with Hagar as the lead man. Ignoring the one album done with Gary Cherone in the lead is justifiable, but can anyone really argue a Van Halen-themed Guitar Hero game is complete without at least a couple tracks from For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge? Nothing from 5150? Nothing from OU812? Nothing from Bala… okay, nevermind that last one. That is insanity. I can only hope it’s a contractual issue, because if it was a design decision, wow was it stupid.

Fourth, as is the case in every single one of these band-themed Guitar Hero games, the non-Van Halen tracks selected for inclusion along with the main band’s stuff almost universally makes no sense. Two words: Stacy’s Frigg’n Mom. How does that happen? How do Semi-Charmed Life and Pretty Fly (for a White Guy) happen? And can we finally retire White Wedding (as awesome as it is) and frigg’n Painkiller (as awesome as it’s not) from any future renditions of these music games? Including filler music in a band-themed game is a bad idea in principle, but in this game the practice reaches entirely new lows.

Fifth, even if you’re going to sell me on a Van Halen game with stereo sound, a game with absolutely no Hagar content, and one that includes tracks from Fountains of Wayne and Jimmy Eat World, you are, under no circumstances, selling me on a Van Halen game that features the band as it exists today. Geezer, over the hill, and without anything new or relevant to say versions of Eddie, Alex, and Roth with Eddie’s kid, Wolfgang*, on bass. The hell? Even in the lone section of the game to show the band in their prime, a six song set where three of the songs are Eddie-only solos, there he is, Wolfgang Van Halen, playing bass. Kid wasn’t even born yet. Erasing Hagar (and, I guess, Cherone) from the band’s history is bad enough, but not one trace of Michael frigg’n Anthony to boot?

Screw Eddie. Screw Alex. Screw Activision for even considering allowing something this inept and hobbled to be made in the first place. I can’t even muster the indignation to say anything bad about Underground’s development job. It’s obvious they had no budget and no freedom. There’s simply no way this is the game they wanted to make. This isn’t a game that anyone would want to make.

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*Note: I’m not bagging on Wolfgang. For all I know the kid could be the best bassist of his generation. The point of my screed is that these band themed games should be a celebration of the history and times of the featured band, not something that pretends most of that history doesn’t exist. If you’re not gonna do that, then offer the tracks as DLC or something. Do not, under any circumstances, make a full-on game. Harmonix understood that when they made Beatles Rock Band.

Guitar Hero: Aerosmith WROCKS... or something

Before he left, Bill dumped a copy of Guitar Hero: Aerosmith on my desk. Since I'm tasked with reviewing it I guess that means I need to suck it up and play it.

And?

It's... uh, surprisingly okay. Not good. Never good. But okay. If you like Aerosmith at least a little bit. With 31 tracks (at least in the main game) I'm having trouble figuring out what justifies someone spending $60 on the game. But, I won't deny that, almost against my will, I got into playing Love in an Elevator, Ragdoll, Sweet Emotion, etc.

Some plusses: They've brightened up the color pallette (at least I think they have). So while it's the same interface and engine as Guitar Hero III, the colorfulness of Guitar Hero II is back. The notion that in moving from venue to venue you're retracing the track the band took on its route to "super stardom" (that hurt to type) is as good a model for progression to follow as any. It's tough to say at this point, but the note charting does seem *a little* better than in GH3. It's not Rock Band quality, but GH3 was an absolute mess in this regard so anything better is good. (I'm playing on Hard right now, so we'll see if the same holds true in Expert.) There are some good non Aerosmith tracks that you play as a 2-set warm-up act in each of the game's venues. (For some reason I can't name a one of 'em off the top of my head.)

Some minuses: As much as I like some of the non-Aerosmith tracks, they shouldn't be in the game. They should be in GH4 where people who, you know, hate Aerosmith or won't pay $60 for an Aerosmith edition, might actually get to play them. If you're gonna go the route of a band exclusive GH game, then do it and don't apologize for it by throwing in some extra non-Aerosmith stuff that won't do anything to sell more copies of the game. As noted above, I'm okay with the notion of the "tour" following Aerosmith's progression as a band, but I think if you're gonna do that then have the songs and the band match the era. So, when you start out at a high school venue (the name escapes me), let's see a young Aerosmith playing their older stuff. It would just add to the flavor and the theme in a way that you don't get when you're playing the same venue with a geriatric Aerosmith playing stuff from 2007.

Ultimately, if you like Guitar Hero and you like Aerosmith and don't mind paying $60 for about 30 tracks, then hey, this is your game. Run don't walk and all that. But let's face it. You probably like Rock Band better than GH (or, at least, you should), don't like Aerosmith *that* much and resent the notion of paying full price for a game with just over a third of the tracks Rock Band 2 or GH4 are purported to have. In that case, just skip it.

The Pain

In The Princess Bride our farmboy hero, "dear sweet Wesley," challenges his nemesis, Prince Humperdink (sp?), to a duel, "to the pain." Frankly, I think I'd rather lose that duel than ever again watch this trailer for Guitar Hero: On Tour for the Nintendo DS. But because misery loves company, I'm embedding it here for your torture. Consider it my contribution to the Hump Day Music Break. Watch it at your own risk.



If you're not sure that you're up to it you might try Googling "Two Girls One Cup," instead. It's only slightly less nauseating.

More Friday Airing of Grievances: Rock Band/GH3 Guitars

Activision, I Have a Big Problem With You!

If you're in that sad group of folks who not only love Guitar Hero and Rock Band, but also want to play them on a PS3 (that's what? five people?) you no doubt know by now that your Guitar Hero 3 guitar doesn't work in Rock Band, despite the fact that GH3 guitars do work with Rock Band on the Xbox 360. Meanwhile, the Rock Band guitar doesn't work in any of the Guitar Hero games, regardless of platform.

Let's be clear on one thing, this compatibility issue lies squarely at the feet of GH publisher, Activision. The saga really started heating up earlier this week when Harmonix (the makers of Rock Band and GH1 and 2) announced that they'd come up with a patch for Rock Band that would allow PS3 GH3 guitars to work with their game, but Sony, at the behest of Activision, would not release it to the public.

That speaks badly enough of Activision as it is. The only thing that could make PR matters worse for them is if they decided to shoot back. This is the quote that Opposable Thumbs (see previous link) is running with:

"In fact, Harmonix and its parent company MTV Games/Viacom recently declined Activision's offer to reach an agreement that would allow the use of Guitar Hero guitar controllers with Rock Band," the statement continues. "We have been and remain open to discussions with Harmonix and MTV Games/Viacom about the use of our technology in Rock Band. Unfortunately for Rock Band users, in this case Harmonix and MTV Games/Viacom are unwilling to discuss an agreement with Activision."

Okay. Seriously. That quote's got holes in it so big you could fly the space shuttle through it. "Activision's offer to reach an agreement"? It doesn't take a lot of imagination to figure that Activision's "offer" included copious amounts of cash, a couple of Harmonix employee's first borns, a signed first edition of The Catcher in the Rye and probably a lifetime subscription to Tiger Beat magazine.

Who does Activision think they're kidding with this? One developer (Harmonix) is on record as wanting an open hardware platform for music peripherals in these games and backs it up by allowing GH controllers to work with Rock Band. (Yes, they do have a vested interest in going this route. Rock Band may be superior, but GH is the franchise with name recognition.) One publisher (Activision/Red Octane) says they won't support the other's peripherals in their game because the quality sucks. As if it matters how good the guitar is if the game itself blows (the GH3 Les Paul, does indeed rock). And GH3 does blow. It's the Hurricane Andrew of the Guitar Hero series. (And the Rock Band fender is having problems, but reports are that the EA replacement policy has been triple-A good in terms of fast turnaround time for a fixed axe.)

Here's a peso's worth of free advice to Activision: just shut up. Anything you say in this debate other than, "we're opening things up so all current guitar peripherals will work in our GH games," is to scream from the top of a building, "Hi there! We're a bunch of flaming assholes!" If you don't want Rock Band fans to be able to use their peripherals in your game, that's your call. But don't pretend it has anything to do with guitar quality or Harmonix not being willing to bend over for you. It has to do with you wanting to have a closed platform such that only your hardware works with your software. Congrats, you're the iPod/iTunes of the guitar game community you bunch of gluttonous wankers.